It is equally important for infants to give them what to eat, how much to eat, and how to feed them, so the content of a baby’s diet and feeding behavior are equally important. To make babies grow up healthily, mothers must be careful to avoid these mistakes! Fathers and mothers all should know these.
Mistake 1: Premature addition of supplementary food.
A few years ago, our view was that pure breastfeeding could last for four months. Now from last year, pure breastfeeding is generally required to last for six months internationally. So don’t add supplementary food too early. If mothers begin to feed babies on rice flour, yolk, and so on when their breast milk is still sufficient, the nutrition babies can get from breast milk will be deprived.
Mistake 2: Yolk is the first choice of supplement food.
What’s kind of supplementary food should babies eat first in their lives? Many parents think it should be yolk. They feel that yolk is nutritious and rich in protein, zinc, and iron. This is wrong. The first supplementary food should be rice flour containing iron, because rice flour is the least likely cause of infant allergy, and is easier to be digested and absorbed than the yolk. Some babies may be allergic to the yolk, so it is suggested that yolk should be added after eight months.
Mistake 3: Muddy food is eaten with milk.
When feeding rice flour or muddy food to babies, some mothers say it’s easy to mix muddy food with milk, which is also a misunderstanding. One reason for feeding babies on muddy food is to add nutrition to them, and the other is to make babies learn to chew. Chewing needs exercise.
Mistake 4: Ignoring babies’ psychological needs when feeding.
When feeding, some mothers are careless and do not make eye contact with their babies. She may be holding the baby in her arms and feeding him/her, but instead of looking at the baby and smiling at the baby with a concerned expression, she looks at the TV or chats with others. The most frightening thing is some bottle-feeding babies, their parents just let them lie in bed and holding the bottle themselves, mothers do not hold them at all. This kind of bottle feeding, although the baby needs to meet material nutrition, the psychological needs are not fully met. Whether breastfeeding or bottle-feeding, parents must hold their children in their arms and communicate with them while feeding, so that their children are physically and psychologically satisfied.
Mistake 5: Premature addition of formula milk powder.
Some mothers added formula milk too early though their breast milk is enough. Why they did so? They said that they feel their breast milk was rarefied. It is wrong. 80% of breast milk is water. It’s a very rare liquid. As long as you have enough breast milk, it can last for 4 to 6 months, and it’s enough for your baby.
Mistake 6: Feed supplementary food with fine granules to babies aged 7 or 8 months.
When babies are 7 to 9 months old, they enter the sensitive period of food texture. And at this time, babies begin to grow teeth gradually and feel their gums itchy and painful. So they especially like to eat rougher supplementary food. This makes them feel interesting, and the rubbing on their gums helps their teeth out.
So after 7 or 8 months, parents can feed some minced meat, vegetable, and rotten porridge to babies, so that babies may be more interested in eating.
Mistake 7: Add salt and condiments to supplementary food too early.
Many parents add salt and condiments to their babies’ supplementary food too early. When mothers cook supplementary food for babies aged 8 to 9 months, they think food without salt and condiments will not be tasty. We, adults, have become accustomed to the sour, salty, bitter, and spicy, so we feel unable to eat the original taste. But babies haven’t eaten salt before, and they do not need so much salt, the salt they need is already contained in the food.
So we needn’t add salt and condiments to babies’ supplementary food when they are under one-year-old. Don’t worry about the babies’ lack of energy because he doesn’t eat salt. Salt from vegetables and all kinds of food is already enough for babies. Besides, premature salt intake is a burden on children’s body and kidneys. And the taste is mutual. If you eat watermelon after you eat sugar, you won’t feel it sweet.
When the amount of salt increases gradually from zero, the taste is gradually rising. If you add salt prematurely, your child will not eat anything that is not salty, and his taste will become saltier and saltier, and he will eat more and more salt in his life. When parents use their tastes to judge the babies’ complimentary food and say it’s a little fragrant, the salt may be too much for the babies, so babies under one-year-old needn’t salt and condiments.
Mistake 8: Feed concentrated milk to babies before going to bed so they won’t be hungry and wake up at night.
Because babies’ nervous system is not well developed, they will not coax themselves to sleep after waking up at night and must be consoled by adults. Adults feel tired when babies wake up three or four times a night, so they feed concentrated milk to babies before they go to bed to make them sleep the night through. It’s wrong. When the baby sleeps, the gastrointestinal tract peristalsis is not so active. The baby’s stomach is difficult to digest this milk. When he gets up in the morning, his mouth will smell sour or smelly, which is the manifestation of his indigestion. It is bad for the baby’s stomach. So when feeding, the consistency must be specified according to the instructions of the milk powder. In this case, the baby EXO formula maker can help you.
Mothers don’t be too worried. When babies are seven or eight months old, or after the age of two, the nervous system develops to a certain extent, babies don’t need to eat at night. So it’s a natural process of development. Don’t give babies too much food to get them to sleep. It may run counter to your desire and damage the digestive system of babies.
How many supplementary foods should children eat every day and every meal?
This is a problem that all parents are concerned about. When starting to add supplementary food, it is necessary to estimate the amount of supplemental food that should be provided according to the infant’s previous eating. The amount of supplemental food a baby receives each time is not fixed, there can be a 20% difference, and the daily intake is not fixed, too. Parents should take each feeding process seriously. If the baby can eat a fixed amount each time, it is best. But as long as the baby does not eat, we should stop feeding.
In addition to taking the amount of supplementary food each meal and the total amount of food each day that children can accept as a reference, the feeding amount should be adjusted gradually according to the results after eating, such as whether it interferes with the intake of milk, whether gastrointestinal discomfort occurs after eating, whether the growth is normal, and so on. Parents should also consider the composition of each supplementary diet, and should judge by the type and nature. Some parents give their children many vegetables and protein food such as meat and eggs while ignoring carbohydrate food such as rice and noodles. It’s not bad to eat more meat and vegetables, but they can’t squeeze out rice, noodles and other food. It is suggested that rice, noodles, and other foods should account for at least half of the total supplementary food, while vegetables, meat, and eggs should not exceed half.